


San Francisco Bay

by slytherinfixation



Category: NCIS, Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Gen, Implied/Ambiguous M/M Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-02
Updated: 2019-01-02
Packaged: 2019-10-03 04:51:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17277398
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/slytherinfixation/pseuds/slytherinfixation
Summary: You don’t send a Colonel to clean up someone else’s mess and you sure as hell don’t put an Air Forceanythingin charge of what could very well be an entire battalion of Marines.





	San Francisco Bay

They’re in San Francisco on a case that’s spanned three weeks and five states when the news comes down that half the bay is under Naval quarantine until further notice. It’s two days before the boat-load of Marines appear, clearly coming off assignment rather than on their way out.

They fill up the bar the team had chosen for their celebratory end of case meal. They’re loud and extremely friendly, even while mostly sober, calling out across the room at each other as they come and go. They’ve all been stationed together a while and their civilian clothing does little to help them blend in.

None of them are displaying rank in any way, and despite the fact that Tony usually finds that sort of thing easy to pick out amongst marines, their seeming all around friendliness means he’s having trouble spotting it.

That is, of course, before one of the younger, slightly drunk marine’s crows, “Major!”

Heads turn all throughout the bar, marines scrambling to their feet at the sight of the short, stocky guy with unusually long hair for the marine corp. He waves a hand and says, “At ease,” before anyone has really finished standing, though, and the noise level returns to its previous level.

The Major heads for the closest group of marines, placing a hand on the shoulder of an older guy – probably an NCO by the looks of it – who looks up at him and grins. The group welcome him with open arms but he only hovers, never taking the offered seat. Then, he’s moving on to the next table that welcomes him just as warmly.

Everyone from the youngest recruit to the vets passed their twenty leans forward across the table to grin at the Major or share in a joke or two. The officer – who’s clearly the highest-ranking man in the room – has a quick laugh and an easy grin, accepting the teasing of his men with aplomb.

Tony is just watching him approach the second-to-last table of Marines in the room when there’s a commotion by the door.

“Attention on deck!”

This time the marines move so fast a chair or two falls over.

There’s a guy standing in the doorway in Air Force dress blues. He’s got the eagles of a full bird Colonel on his shoulders and a chest full of medals that wouldn’t be out of place on a three-star Admiral. He reaches up a hand to take off his cap and then reaches up his other hand to run it through his head of thick black hair.

He’s far younger than Tony was expecting. Not even a hint of grey at his temple line, he doesn’t look any older than the Major who’s been making the rounds.

And Tony is suddenly reconsidering his original assumption that the Major was a marine.

The Colonel surveys the room, taking in all the marines present, as well as the few tables who’ve stuck out the intrusion. He skips straight over a group of younger women staring openly at him, passed the double date going on in a corner and his eyes fall on the NCIS team.

There’s a moment where his eyes sweep over each of them in turn – first Gibbs, who he seems to have picked as a marine without any trouble; then Tony, who feels like he’s just been examined from the inside out when it’s over; Tim, who he barely even glances at in order to have him pegged; and, finally, Ziva, where his face goes blank after a moment and he turns his head away.

“At ease,” he says and the marines return to their seats and their conversations, seeming not to have noticed his brief distraction.

They’re a little quieter now, but not by much.

The Colonel starts at the same table the Major did, clapping the exact same NCO on the shoulder as he does so. Tony notices now that the guy doesn’t have a beer in front of him, looks completely sober, even, and wonders if he’s the SNCO in the room. It could be because he was expecting the presence of a Major and a full-bird, but the way he seems to be openly friendly with them both suggests they wouldn’t have minded either way.

The Colonel bends at the waist to speak in the other man’s ear for a few moments. They turn their heads simultaneously and the other man speaks back into his ear for about three times as long. The Colonel nods and straightens, his eyes sweeping briefly to a table of the youngest bunch of marines who’ve been getting rowdier by the minute, and then away again.

He doesn’t spend as long at each table as the Major did, stopping to exchange only a few words - just checking in, probably – before he moves on.

Tony wonders suddenly if the Major’s aplomb comes from time spent under the Colonel’s command style or if he’d always been that relaxed around his own men.

The two officers catch up to each other at the last table where the Major has taken a seat. The youngest man at the table stands to quickly fetch a chair for the Colonel, who turns the chair around and straddles it backwards - despite his neatly pressed uniform - with his forearms resting across the back. Another man, this one a little older, returns from the bar with two beers, setting down one in front of each.

Across the slightly lower noise level and the shorter distance now between them, Tony hears the Colonel speak.

“Thanks, Captain.”

The man nods and takes the last empty seat at the table and now that he knows it’s there, the Officers’ table  _ is _ rather obvious to pick out. None of them have had more than two beers and every last one of them – from the Colonel to the Lieutenant who got him a chair – is watching the loudest table with what is gradually becoming a wary frown.

They have all of five minutes of peace before one of the marines they’re watching knocks over a glass and the sound of it shattering echoes in the sudden silence.

Tony turns his head to see the officers’ reactions.

The three or four Lieutenants are all half out of their seats, clearly used to dealing with such things in their senior’s wake. The Major, too, is already standing.

The Colonel beats all of them across the room.

He corrals the man who knocked over the glass - and is now loudly blaming one of the other marines - by wrapping a hand around the back of his neck and pulling him close.

Gibbs is half out of his chair, drawing the attention of the marines at the nearest two tables – one of which is full of officers. The marine in the Colonel’s grip goes pliant and shuts up immediately. His head drops to his chest and he won’t look the older man in the eye.

The Colonel speaks in his ear while the other man nods.

After a moment, seeming accepting the response, the Colonel lets him go and makes a gesture with his hand. The SNCO from by the door is already standing, heads over and takes the young man off the Colonel’s hands.

“You lot as well,” the Colonel says, raising an eyebrow at one of the kids at the table when he opens his mouth to protest. “How much you had to drink, Corporal?”

The young man closes his mouth and swallows before responding, “Too much, Sir.”

The Colonel smirks and gestures him towards the door, “Good answer.”

Two other NCOs stand from other tables and help corral the group of tipsy enlisted out of the bar and presumably back to wherever they came from.

“I hope that’s the last person I have to tell to take themselves home tonight,” the Colonel says aloud, seemingly to no one.

There’s a chorus of “Yes, Sir,” around the room and the Colonel heads over to the bar with his wallet already half out – presumably to pay for the broken glass. As he does so, one of the other tables clearly decides they’ve also had enough and stand to leave.

The number of marines in the room drops from seven tables to four.

On his way back passed, the Colonel stops at their table, “San Francisco is an interesting place for NCIS to be hanging out.”

Gibbs narrows his eyes, “There’s a Naval quarantine over half the bay.”

“Is there?” the Colonel says and Tony’s mind is already forming all sorts of conspiracies – downed experimental aircraft, stolen illicit Air Force submarine, unexploded nuclear warhead, that sort of thing.

Because the Air Force Colonel in front of them truly looks like he has no idea what they’re talking about, but he’s also clearly the CO of wherever the hell the bar full of marines has come from.

You don’t send a Colonel to clean up someone else’s mess and you sure as hell don’t put an Air Force  _ anything _ in charge of what could very well be an entire battalion of Marines.

Tony smiles up at the other man when Gibbs just narrows his eyes further, “Just wrapped up a case. We’re flying home tomorrow.”

The Colonel nods at Tony but doesn’t take his eyes off Gibbs, “I’d appreciate you letting me handle my own men, Agent.”

“Have it your way,  _ flyboy _ .”

One of the marine officers at the table straightens and turns his head to look at them over his shoulder, clearly having heard and –  _ wow _ – actually taking offense at the insult to his Air Force CO. The Major follows the movement of his subordinate’s head and frowns when he catches sight of the Colonel and Gibbs staring at each other.

The Colonel, however, just smirks at the comment, “I assure you,  _ Marine _ , whatever the hell you want to call me, I’ve heard it all before.”

He doesn’t wait for a response, moving back over to his seat and turning it to face the correct way at the table. When he sits, he slouches back in it like he’s not surrounded by junior officers and proceeds to let the conversation flow around him.

He laughs when the others do and it’s clear the other officers, even all the way to the most junior Lieutenant, don’t fear his response or his temper.

At one point, the Major stands up to get them both another beer and when he retakes his seat, their chairs lineup close enough that their thighs are touching. 

The Colonel doesn’t react, his attention on the Captain who got them their first drink. He’s telling a story with wild hand waving, one of the other Captains and one of the Lieutenants interrupting him with a grin on occasion.

None of the other Officers looks at them even half-a-second longer than before, suggesting they don’t see anything out of the ordinary in the contact.

Maybe Tony’s investigative brain is just paranoid.


End file.
